The khandhas are there as long as there is conditioned existence.
Now the Buddha could not see a beginning to sansara, that is, He could not see a time in the past when beings were free of, or existed independently, of the khandhas.
Before coming to Buddhadhamma I gave a reasonable credence, one that at least deserved investigation,to the Mahāyāna teaching of the Alayavijnana, a kind of ‘infinite storehouse or repository of UNDIFFERENTIATED consciousness’, out of which sparks, as it were, eternally issue forth in a quest to acquire individualization through conditioned existence, all the while rendering that Alayavijnana itself ever more self-conscious. IT would be the source, the spark would be our original state or condition of being therein, and all our time since, acquiring individuality through skhandhas etc,would correspond to our condition in sansara.
However that may be, I have given up looking for answers to the great issues of life in philosophical concepts,however subtle or esoteric, because that does not address the constant and urgent need to ELIMINATE SUFFERING – and there has arisen in me an even greater sense of urgency on the contemplation, not to say fear, of the Buddha’s FULL exposition on suffering, the great dangers of FUTURE suffering.
Suffice it to reflect on the Sutta about the man wounded by a poisoned arrow: he would want the arrow removed AT ONCE, and the one extracting the arrow would put aside questions about who shot the arrow, what it was made from etc.
y not